Sigh. Just received this email from the folks at Pandora. What a shame, Pandora is by far the best internet radio station out there.

hi, it’s Tim,

This is an email I hoped I would never have to send.

As you probably know, in July of 2007 we had to block usage of Pandora outside the U.S. because of the lack of a viable license structure for Internet radio streaming in other countries. It was a terrible day. We did however hold out some hope that a solution might exist for the UK, so we left it unblocked as we worked diligently with the rights organizations to negotiate an economically workable license fee. After over a year of trying, this has proved impossible. Both the PPL (which represents the record labels) and the MCPS/PRS Alliance (which represents music publishers) have demanded per track performance minima rates which are far too high to allow ad supported radio to operate and so, hugely disappointing and depressing to us as it is, we have to block the last territory outside of the US.

Based upon the IP address from which you recently visited Pandora, it appears that you are listening from the UK. If you are, in fact, listening from the US, please contact Pandora Support: pandora-support@pandora.com.

It continues to astound me and the rest of the team here that the industry is not working more constructively to support the growth of services that introduce listeners to new music and that are totally supportive of paying fair royalties to the creators of music. I don’t often say such things, but the course being charted by the labels and publishers and their representative organizations is nothing short of disastrous for artists whom they purport to represent – and by that I mean both well known and indie artists. The only consequence of failing to support companies like Pandora that are attempting to build a sustainable radio business for the future will be the continued explosion of piracy, the continued constriction of opportunities for working musicians, and a worsening drought of new music for fans. As a former working musician myself, I find it very troubling.

We have been told to sign these totally unworkable license rates or switch off, non-negotiable…so that is what we are doing. Streaming illegally is just not in our DNA, and we have to take the threats of legal action seriously. Lest you think this is solely an international problem, you should know that we are also fighting for our survival here in the US, in the face of a crushing increase in web radio royalty rates, which if left unchanged, would mean the end of Pandora.

We know what an epicenter of musical creativity and fan support the UK has always been, which makes the prospect of not being able to launch there and having to block our first listeners all the more upsetting for us.

We know there is a lot of support from listeners and artists in the UK for Pandora and remain hopeful that at some point we’ll get beyond this. We’re going to keep fighting for a fair and workable rate structure that will allow us to bring Pandora back to you. We’ll be sure to let you know if Pandora becomes available in the UK. There may well come a day when we need to make a direct appeal for your support to move for governmental intervention as we have in the US. In the meantime, we have no choice but to turn off service to the UK.

Author: Jack Hughes

An experienced software engineer with 20+ years experience writing products for Microsoft Windows based operating systems as well as 12+ years experience hosting websites on Linux and Windows including e-commerce and CMS systems.
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I hadn’t heard of Pandora before, but this is just yet another sad consequence of the – what seem to me – totally crazy and off-our-planet ideas that the music/film industry come up with to try and screw their customers.

Did you hear about Sony’s new stand on non-DRM music? (See this post by Glyn Moody: http://opendotdotdot.blogspot.com/2008/01/confirmed-sony-is-barking.html) They are going to start selling DRM free music for download, but, YOU HAVE TO GO TO A PHYSICAL SHOP FIRST, choose the album, you then buy a plastic card with a code on it, then you can go home and download your DRM free music!

The Radio thing could be easily worked around by some judicious use of tunnelling so the industries’ plans will almost certainly be rendered obsolete yet again before their ink is dry… They just don’t seem to get the Internet enabled, digital world we all live in now.

@Alan – Happy new year Alan. He does sound upset and I don’t blame him. As somebody who really enjoys the physical shopping experience, I don’t think the internet has added much to my music enjoyment. If it were a toss up between shops and the internet I would go for record shops. Physical products are nicer to buy, it doesn’t feel the same buying on iTunes. I suspect I’m just showing my age…I used to love flicking through albums in musty smelling second hand record stores. Same with books. Digital products just don’t have as good an experience.

If you have just found that your IP is banned since you are not in the USA, get a VPN account at http://www.strongvpn.com I was blocked, got the account.. connected with no degradation in speed… and was in business again! It’s a great solution.